Around a thousand people requested asylum in the Netherlands last week

Around a thousand people submitted a request for asylum in the Netherlands last week. Rounded off, that is the same number as the week before. The inflow is, therefore, again higher than in recent months. Around this time last year, the number of applications started to rise around this time last year too, which then continued until April.

The weekly numbers provided by the Ministry of Asylum and Migration are rounded up by the hundred. Therefore, it is not known exactly how many people requested asylum. In addition, the number does not just consist of new requests but also of relatives from people who have already been granted asylum. People who are requesting asylum again are also among the numbers.

Between the beginning of April and mid-September, there was one week with a rounded figure of a thousand applications for asylum. The other 22 weeks always had fewer than a thousand people requesting asylum.

On Monday, a sports hall in Zutphen was made available to receive asylum seekers for a week. If the asylum center of Ter Apel is overcrowded, hundreds of people could be brought to the Hanzehal.

After initial reporting from Omroep Gelderland, the municipality of Zutphen said that the Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA) asked them last weekend to have an emergency option ready in case. "The expectation is that the asylum center could reach its maximum again during the course of the week. Thus far, there has been no concrete request to receive people," the municipality added.

The COA responded that they do not know what to expect in the coming days and cannot say whether Ter Apel will be too full. "We still have to take stock. It has been busy for months, but there are degrees of busyness," says a spokeswoman. Whether more municipalities have been asked to keep a shelter available is also unknown.